The 6th International Barcode of Life Conference

This week at the University of Guelph, the 6th International Barcode of Life Conference is being held. That means that there are literally hundreds of scientists roaming around campus and the city, discussing how to further our knowledge and improve the way we study biodiversity. Pretty exciting right? The theme of this year’s conference is “Barcodes to Biomes”, which seems to be the ideal motto. It hits on the expanding field of biodiversity science, and if you walk around the conference for a few minutes, you can see what a global phenomenon DNA barcoding has really become. Hundreds of delegates from all over the world have come to Guelph to listen to their fellow scientists, network, and figure out what our next steps should be.

Participants entering Rozanski Hall to attend the first plenary talks of the conferenceOne of the conference banners that can be found hanging all over Rozanski HallBIO CEO Mario Thomas, happily waiting for the talks to begin!

So far, the talks have gone amazingly well, and have been informative and inspiring. Paul Hebert revealed his groundbreaking, revolutionary plan to barcode the world with the Planetary Biodiversity Mission. You can view Paul Hebert’s talk on YouTube.

Along with the ecologists, biologists, geneticists, etcetera-ists, there are also a ton of people that are helping make this conference happen, by organizing events, feeding the participants, manning the registration desk, and making sure everything runs smoothly.

Registration desk covered in swagParticipants registeringConference participants’ tote bagBarcode of Life USBs, loaded with the abstracts of all the presentersOrganizers Vanessa Breton and Susana Miranda RomoMid-conference coffee break snack. Yum!Rick Turner and Alex Smith enjoying the coffee breakDirk Neumann checking out a conference pamphletThe amazing University of Guelph hospitality staff, preparing a delicious lunch for the conference participants

Tonight the poster presentations will spark even more discussion, and the rest of the week promises many more exciting talks and events!

A rare BioBlitz

A rare BioBlitz

Hello everyone, today I want to tell you about my first BioBlitz! It was held at rare Charitable Research Reserve on Sunday, August 16th. I have previously visited rare to do some standardized sampling with Dan and Kareina, so I knew where we were going, but as this was my first BioBlitz I didn’t know what I was getting myself into. Our BIO collections team had been preparing almost all week for it, so I knew we’d have a ton of fun.

I arrived at 12:30, pulling up to the barn that was to be our home base. The rare team had set up tents and tables for us to eat at later, and we had a variety of stations set up inside the barn for the actual science stuff! The first teams went out to do some fieldwork, and bring back samples. I went with a rare representative and another BIO member, and boy were we hot! We were sampling a wetland on Blair Flats, where we had previously set up a malaise trap and some bucket light traps. At first we were unsuccessful in finding water where we could get some aquatic samples from. Although the area itself contained an abundance of wetland plants, and no doubt had a solid groundwater supply, it was dry at the surface where we first started. Moving to the middle of the wetland area we managed to find a few feet of water to grab some aquatic samples to bring back and sort at our base.

Me looking through aquatic samplesParticipants identifying Lepidoptera in the field

When we were back at the barn which was serving as our base, we brought the samples to our sorting and IDing station. There were a variety of sorting stations, including an imaging station, plate-making stations, an archive material reference station and others. I spent the afternoon sorting through three different aquatic samples, picking out the specimens and sorting them based on order into vials. We found hirudineans (leeches), a variety of hemipterans (true bugs), coleopterans (beetles), molluscs (snails), some collembolans (springtails), ephemeropterans (mayflies) and zygopterans (damselflies).

Participants sorting through what we caughtFungi team going over what they found

All in all it was an incredibly successful BioBlitz. We found well over 4000 specimens, and they are now being processed at BIO! We will definitely be running another one in the future!